Attack of the killer mom

I've been having issues with pests in my house.

No, not the kids. This time.

I'm talking about 4- and 6-legged pests. Mice and ants. I have a standing rule in my house - if it has more than 2 legs and wasn't invited to come in, it will die. Some call it cruel and heartless, but I just can't stand any unwanted critters. I'm not afraid of them, and I don't jump up on a chair when I see a mouse, but I will kill them.

I found the telltale signs of mice in one of my cabinets a few days ago, and since then two unfortunate rodents have exited the house in garbage bags to meet their maker in the great landfill. As it turned out, upon further inspection, I realized that there was a huge gap in the back of the cabinet where the floor of it didn't meet the back wall - so that's where they were coming in to do their dirty work.

I've also had issues with ants ever since we moved into this place. I guess they're the "sugar ant" variety - little tiny black things that just will not go away, no matter how many traps I put on the counters. I scrub the counters daily to make sure that there are no crumbs, and within minutes, they're back. I've tried every home remedy from baby powder to cinnamon, and nothing would get rid of them. So, although I try to use the natural stuff whenever I can, I knew that it was time to declare chemical war.

I made a quick trip to the hardware store today and $10 later emerged with a can of ant spray and a can of spray-in foam goo stuff.

Everything came off of the counters and I soaked the counters with the ant spray - at this point, I didn't care if the counters disintegrated - the ants were going to die. There's a tiny little gap between the counter and the backsplash, and I suspect that they might be coming in through there, so it got a heavy shot along the entire length of it.

I have to admit that I enjoyed a bit of sadistic pleasure watching the ants shrivel up and die the instant the spray touched them - so sue me. They're in my territory. I let that soak for a while and then wiped down the counters and put everything back.

Then I started working on the gaps in the cabinets. I had never used that spray-in goo before, so that was kind of interesting. I wasn't quite prepared for how much it would expand - but it certainly sealed up the gaps.

When I got done with that and got everything put away, I used more of the spray-in goo in the bathroom, where someone decided that it would be smart to leave about a 1" gap between the bottom of the walls and the floor - so that's all filled in now too, but I have to go around with a knife and trim it up so that it looks a little bit better. I sprayed more ant spray in the bathroom and all around the baseboards in the kitchen, so hopefully, all of my pests will now be gone....

And at least my kitchen is somewhat clean too.

Turned out to be a pretty productive day, after getting zero sleep due to a kid puking all night long....but we did take a nice long nap together this morning so that helped to rejuvenate me a little bit. The weather is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous tomorrow so I'm going to try to maybe do some work outside and go for a run at some point so that I can prepare a little more for this 5K on Saturday - although I'm running into a potential issue with finding someone to watch the boys since The Dude is still having issues with his neck. But, I'll figure something out and everything will work out in the end.

I might lose what little bit of sanity I have left before that happens....but that's nothing new!